


Aftermath

by hollowanchors



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-28
Updated: 2013-12-28
Packaged: 2018-01-06 11:24:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1106243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollowanchors/pseuds/hollowanchors
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two years after Sherlock jumps off of St. Bartholomew's Hospital he returns to 221 B to find John hung up on his grief and drowning what he can in whatever alcohol he can find.  I really suck and summaries and I have no idea what I'm doing and I don't want to give a whole bunch away and for all I know you've read 1,000 fics just like this one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea if someone has already done a fic like this, and if they have, I apologize! I'm not trying to steal someone else's idea but I was watching Sherlock tonight and I couldn't get this idea out of my head and I started writing and haven't stopped. I know that the characters aren't exactly the way they are in the show but this is my first time writing and I was having a bit of trouble keeping them to character (unfortunately). Also, since it's my first time ever showing anyone anything that I've written (with the exception of my mother, who is almost obligated as a mother to tell me that she likes it) so I hope that it's not too bad!
> 
> Also, I haven't edited it so if there are any mistakes please just bear with me!!

It was four o'clock on a Saturday morning when Sherlock came home, walking through the door of 221 B for the first time in two years.  The sky was gray and upstairs the neighbors could be heard arguing in voice too loud to be decent for the time.

  


The flat, much to Sherlock's surprise, looked almost the same as when he had left.  The coffee table and the desk were cluttered, hidden under stacks of papers and old magazines.  The bookshelf was still overflowing with novels and textbooks that he had read from cover to cover, some more than once.  Under the chairs was still dusty and there was a still a stain on the throw pillow that was still carelessly thrown on the cushion.  The wall opposite the fireplace still held a reminder of the mind-numbing boredom that he was often forced to endure between cases.  Six reminders to be exact.  And on the couch, feet on one armrest and head on the other, was Dr. John Watson on his back, fast asleep, his hand hanging over the edge, brushing the floor.

 

He wouldn't wake for another three hours, time that Sherlock spent simply watching his dearest friend from his new post on the arm chair, taking note of the minute changes in the war veteran.  There were dark, bruise-like shadows that Sherlock didn't remember seeing under John's empathetic, blue-gray eyes.  They contrasted drastically with skin that was more chalky and less ivory than Sherlock remembered.  His hair was getting longer, due for a cut soon.  He did up one button less than he used to on his shirt.  His knuckles were bruised and he reeked of alcohol.  He had lost a considerable amount of weight, reminding Sherlock of when they had first met and John, just returned from Afghanistan, had a tendency to leave his food untouched.

 

Sherlock was well aware that he was lucky to have, of the 8.147 million people in London, John Watson as a flatmate and even more lucky to have found a friend in him.  In his time spent away from England, most of it spent in solitude and silence left unbroken unless it was his own voice, he had more time to reflect on his life in 221 B when he wasn't blowing up the castles and tearing down what he could find of Moriarty's kingdom.  He knew that his treatment of his friends was less than it should have been, well aware that he was using defense mechanisms against those that he shouldn't have.  Shielding himself with a superiority complex and rude remarks against people--friends--that wouldn't hurt him.  He wasn't in university anymore and he wasn't surrounded by kids that didn't know the depth of a cut left by a few words or the scars that angry glances and scowls left.  But if he thought that building up his walls was hard then tearing them down was twice as bad.  Even when he'd found people that he would be more than willing to die to protect he still treated them like they were below him.  At times when his mind wasn't occupied with puzzles and dead bodies he wished that he wasn't as rude but he couldn't help it.  Words come out of his mouth as soon as the thought is formed, sometimes before it's finished, and majority of the time he doesn't even realize that he is being rude.  Looking back on those moments though, he knew that he was and he had to applaud John for sticking around for as long as he did, as a flatmate and as a friend.  And he knew he was lucky to have John, someone who, upon first meeting him, was kind instead of cruel and impressed instead of insulted or angered despite anything Sherlock might have said.  He could only hope that he could find a way to repair that friendship when John woke up and found him in their flat again after believing him to be dead for two years, if John wanted him to stay at all.

 

o0o

 

John forced his heavy eyelids open and dragged a hand that felt as though it was made from lead up to rub his face, closing his eyes again.  His head was pounding and the inside of his eye sockets ached.  He had a dim, vague memory of getting in a bit of a brawl at the pub last night but only got in a few punches before he was escorted outside.  Something about Sherlock, he was sure.  It was always something about Sherlock.  Two years later and people couldn't let it go, couldn't just leave him alone.  Some drunken bloke would pull up a bar stool next to him and start going on about how Sherlock was a fraud, how he was a fraud or he wouldn't have jumped off St. Bartholomew's Hospital--the damned building.  And he would get angry, so horribly and thoroughly _angry_ , that he couldn't help but to hit the asshole who thought that he had the right to say something like that.  

 

He opened his eyes just wide enough to look at his watch-- _two minutes behind_ , he reminded himself, like it mattered--but not wide enough to let in too much light.  Seven o'clock. Which meant that he only slept for four hours.  He pushed himself into a sitting position, daring to open his eyes a little wider.  There was a time that he wouldn't have been able to function on any less than six hours of sleep but these days he was lucky to get four, it was the most he had managed to get this week.  With a smile but not without a stab of pain he thought of the days when he would work a case with Sherlock.  He could still see the brilliant man, his best friend, pacing back and forth in front of the fireplace or laying on his back on this very couch, eyes wide open, unable to sleep, his thoughts consumed with the case as he worked feverishly.  His memories of Sherlock, even his fondest ones, seemed to be poisoned with his anger or grief and even when he could look back on something with a smile on his face his stomach would still twist.  He recognized it as bittersweet but that didn't feel like quite the word for it.  Emotions were bigger and deeper than any word he'd found yet.

 

A new surge of frustration rushed through him, laced with the usual sadness.  It wasn't fair.  Why did Sherlock--of all people,  _Sherlock_ \--have to die?

 

John rubbed his face again, which was already cradled in his hands.  He still hadn't found the motivation to open his eyes and brave the sunlight that was undoubtedly glaring at him through the window; he'd had worse migraines but he wasn't keen on the idea of making his head pound more.  He hated that he drank so much these days, but he couldn't stop.  It seemed like every thought of Sherlock was followed by, preferably, a glass of scotch and it seemed like every thought was of Sherlock.  A lady walking down the street with a pink skirt reminded him of the first case he'd ever seen Sherlock solve.  A yellow car would remind him of the yellow paint used by the Tong.  The sound of water would bring up the memory of the swimming pool at midnight and their first--well, second encounter with Moriarty. The good for nothing bastard. 

 

John groaned.  He knew that his little brooding session would soon be followed with more alcohol.  It wasn't necessarily a matter of time, just a matter of how long it took him to put his nausea to the test of movement.

 

He wished that he could hate the drink but the intoxication had saved him from worse things, like facing reality.  The first time he'd picked up a drink was two days after Sherlock had...jumped, the first day he'd spent in the flat in a state of numb shock.  From there it had just gotten worse and worse.  He had left the flat that night because he needed  _something_ , anything that would be a distraction.  His first instinct wasn't alcohol at all, it was smoking but with his first cigarette between his teeth all he could think about was Sherlock and his craving for the nicotine and how John had hid constantly hid his packs.  'Bad news for brain-work,' Sherlock had said once, John scoffed and nearly laughed, smoke coming out with his breath, as if his mind was anything special.   After two drags he'd stomped it out and headed for a pub.  

 

"Come on, John," he muttered to himself.  He knew it was time to get up and get on with things, even if though undoubted included the intake of more alcohol.  He dropped his hands into his lap, stood, and faced the kitchen and that's when he saw  _him._   John blinked, his eyes were still blurry with sleep, he was still tired, they were playing tricks on him he knew, but when he opened them again Sherlock was still there, sitting in the armchair as if he had never been gone.  As if John had just gone on an unannounced bender and he was waiting for him to wake to tell him about something that was so intellectually far above him.  As if he hadn't fallen from the roof of St. Bartholomew's.  As if he hadn't hit the ground.  As if the concrete hadn't been stained with his blood.  

 

John sighed.  He'd been expecting something like this to happen for a long, long time.  Three weeks after they had buried his friend he'd started dreaming about him after passing out on the couch.  Not replaying memories, his mind was making new scenarios and things that had never happened.  When John woke up he could never remember what had happened or what Sherlock had said, just the look in his eyes and his long fingers running through his hair as he thought.  For how drunk he was getting at the time he was amazed at how real the dreams seemed.  After that John would think that he had seen the swish of Sherlock's trench coat going around a corner in the flat, but Sherlock was never there.  He supposed it was only a matter of time before he started seeing things, whether it was due to his mind cracking or consumption of intoxicating drinks.

 

John stared at him for what seemed like years but was probably closer to three minutes.  He didn't say anything, he just looked.  It was almost exactly like John remembered him.  Dark hair, high cheekbones, eyes that were like a universe unto themselves.  

 

"Hello, John," he finally said.  John felt something fracture inside of him, after all this time, most of it spent in a haze, he had thought that he'd forgotten the way his friend's voice sounded.  Deep and formal and now, though he would hate to admit it out loud, soothing.

 

"Hello..." he croaked, his throat sore from doing who knows what.  He'd meant to finish with Sherlock's name but he couldn't force it past his teeth.  

 

"I see that these past two years have treated you...less than well," Sherlock commented.  

 

John cleared his throat.  He wondered offhandedly if Mrs. Hudson could hear him downstairs, the walls were horribly thin.  He knew she wouldn't hear the deep, rumbling bass of Sherlock's voice, just him, talking to no one.  He was well aware that if she walked in on that it would probably be the last straw; she had been letting him live here for almost no rent and had tolerated his drinking but after two years he feared she was getting fed up.  "Um, yes, well...I'm going to make some tea, would you like some?"

 

"Yes....please," he seemed to add as an afterthought.

 

John shuffled towards the kitchen, his stomach twisted and bile rising in the back of his throat.  Before he'd even reached the threshold he found himself running and, upon reaching the sink, emptying the contents of his stomach into it.  

 

When he'd finished he looked over his shoulder and, to his surprise, he could still see the back of Sherlock's head.  Truth be told, he had figured that once he looked away the hallucination would disappear but he could still see him as clearly as he could see anything else in the flat.  

 

Choosing not to ponder on it for too long, he turned and placed the kettle on the stove.  In fact, he didn't even want to think about it at all, not quite ready to face his own insanity.  He stumbled toward the fridge, pulling out a half empty bottle of scotch.  That's all the fridge was really home to these days, bottles of scotch, vodka, and bourbon.  His stomach gave a jolt as he remembered the days when it held parts of cadavers and little food, not that it had much food in it now.  

 

He looked nervously over his shoulder again but Sherlock was still there.  

 

o0o

 

Two weeks had passed since Sherlock had returned to the flat.  John didn't go out much but, much to Sherlock's relief, wasn't drinking as much but still wasn't eating enough to constitute any nourishment.  When he first moved into the flat Sherlock knew that John's lack of eating was due to the war.  It wasn't uncommon for soldiers coming back to go without food, not for cosmetic reasons but because they often didn't see the point in eating.  Sherlock didn't pressure John into eating too much as, when he ate more than a bite or two, it just came right back up.

 

But that wasn't the only thing that different about John.  Once he slept so much that it would almost be considered too much but now it wasn't a surprise if Sherlock came out of his room in the early hours of the morning to find John wide awake, sitting at the table or on the couch staring off at some spot on the wall.  It was times like this that the shadows under his eyes seemed even more prominent.  

 

And often times Sherlock would look up from what he was doing or the book that he was reading to find John staring unabashedly at him as if he thought he might disappear in the blink of an eye.  

 

Though Sherlock had trouble finding a way to admit it out loud, he was worried about John.  If Sherlock was the mind of their duo, then John was the heart.  He was kind and he displayed emotions through his actions and expressions; he laughed, he smiled, he frowned.  It wasn't until that was gone that Sherlock realized he had assumed it was an inherent, permanent part of John.   Now he was nothing short of a ghost.

 

He had also expected some emotional display from his friend upon his return.  He wasn't sure what and supposed it depended on how John felt about what Sherlock had done.  Yelling, maybe, or flat-out denial that he wasn't dead but  _something_.  Not  _this_.  John had accepted Sherlock back into life at 221 B without a second thought, as if he had never left.  He hadn't even brought up the day that Sherlock faked his death or asked how it was even humanly possible that he was alive, that he had seen his dead body.  

 

Sherlock was concerned for his friend but he had no way of showing it and, if John wasn't going to question it, then he didn't want to be the first to bring up the day that he had jumped off of St. Bartholomew's Hospital in front of him.  So, he followed John's suit and went about life at 221 B as if he had spent every day living here since he'd moved in and did his best to ignore John's new, albeit odd habits.

 

o0o

 

A total of three weeks and five days had passed since Sherlock returned to the flat and, for the first time upon his reappearance, someone knocked on the door.  

 

He looked up from the desk to John, who was sitting on the couch with his eyes shut, no doubt enduring the pain of migraine caused by yet another hangover, something that Sherlock had long since realized had become normal for John in the mornings.  Once, in what he was sure was a failed attempt to show his concern for John's drinking habits, he'd blurted out, "I thought that you disliked that your sister drank."

 

John had stared at him for a moment before answering.  "I do."

 

"Then why do you drink so much?"

 

"Things change Sherlock," was all that he had said and neither one of them brought it up after that.

 

The knock came again, a little louder this time, and John flinched.  

 

"Where you expecting someone?" Sherlock asked.

 

He shook his head but murmured, so quietly that Sherlock almost missed it, "I'll get it."

 

Laboriously, he lifted himself from the couch and moved to the door.  He opened it just a crack but not enough for Sherlock to see who had arrived unannounced.

 

"Morning," John muttered.

 

"It's almost noon," a voice that Sherlock instantly recognized as Lestrade's answered.

 

"Still morning."

 

"Yeah, well...can I come in?" John took a step back and opened the door just wide enough for Lestrade to come in.  "Mrs. Hudson called.  We've been a bit worried about you.  She said that you hadn't been out to the pub or the store.  I mean, if you're not drinking anymore that's great we just didn't want to find you...."

 

Lestrade trailed off when his eyes landed on Sherlock.  His eyes were wide with pure shock and he stumbled back a step, dropping the paper bag that he had had in his hand.  "Oh, hell...no, it can't..."

 

When Lestrade had laid eyes on him, Sherlock's eyes were on John, who was looking more and more stunned with every passing second.  Shock outlined his tired, bloodshot eyes, his lips parted, and it seemed like he was fighting for breath.

 

The detective inspector spun around and looked at John, nearly shouting at him.  "He's is  _alive_?"

 

And then everything made sense.  Why John would stare at him as if he was going to disappear at the drop of a hat.  Why, on that first morning, he didn't even question that his friend was alive or why he was in the flat.  Why he had never brought up the day that he had thought Sherlock committed suicide.  All the puzzle pieces falling together in his mind a mere second before John spoke.

 

" _You can see him too_?"

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

John's voice was hoarse and he choked on his words.  Despite that, not a soul could have missed the spectrum of emotions coursing through him, plain on his face and in his broken voice.

 

Disbelief.  Heartache.  Trauma.  Anguish.  A brief flicker of joy.  And finally, anger. 

 

Sherlock could have verbally rebuked himself for not noticing, for failing to solve the puzzle because he was too close to the pieces.  It was obvious.   _So_  obvious.  And the explanation, the solution for the riddles, had been right in front of him the entire time.  John's new habit of blatantly staring at him without shame as if he was capable of dissolving on the spot was only because, in John's mind, he was capable of disintegrating, disappearing again forever.  A hallucination with the price of the possibility of retreating back in to a broken psyche.  He didn't question his return or his survival because he hadn't realized that the past few weeks they'd spent in the flat together, in a state of perpetual silence interrupted only by daily, polite inquiries and the occasional night of violin, was reality.  John had dismissed his return as a projection of his imagination originating from a mind weighed down with alcohol and grief.  He spoke softly to Sherlock (something he had dismissed as an attempt not to aggravate the headaches caused by his binges and resulting hangovers), deliberated each question or reply, and chose his words carefully when he had never bothered with any of that before because he was afraid that a loud exclamation or the wrong phrase would shatter the illusion.  

 

He turned to Lestrade first, his voice low but absolute.  "Out.  Get out."

 

The detective inspector didn't hesitate and nearly fled the premise.  Sherlock couldn't say that he blamed him and, with the emotional display that was no doubt coming, he wished that he could have followed.  

 

John locked eyes with Sherlock.  Anger.  Animosity.  Rage.  Enmity.  Antipathy.  Distaste.  Animus.  Hostility.  Detestation.  Loathing.  Hatred.  He couldn't find a word that was able to contain or label the passionate rage burning in the blue-gray eyes that he had always subconsciously associated with kindness.  He didn't say anything though, whether it was out of fear of angering John further or because he was at a loss for words he couldn't tell.  He wouldn't deny that he had thought of his return while he was in hiding, involuntarily imagining several scenarios but none of them were even close to this.  He had been prepared for his friend to display hostility but not at this degree.

 

"You..." John started, his voice low, but trailed off, clenching his teeth.  When he was like this, eyes flashing, nostrils flaring, hands curled into fists at his sides, entire body tense, Sherlock found that he didn't doubt that he was capable of killing while he could never imagine John committing the act before.  "You are absolutely  _unbelievable_.  I can't even..."

 

He trailed off again and Sherlock knew that it wasn't due to lack of words, he was sure that John had more than enough of them racing through his mind, but a matter of choosing the ones that could display the past two years for him correctly.  For the first time, Sherlock thought about how hard it must have been for John.  In retrospect, he had had it easy despite all that he had been doing.  He had known that John was okay--well, he had known that he was still breathing.  If their positions had been reversed, Sherlock realized that he would have fared much worse.  While he didn't treat John the way that people would expect one to treat their friends, especially not their best ones, he was fond of him.  Very fond.  He had long since realized, but not quite admitted, even to himself, that he loved John.  Friendship was, obviously, not Sherlock's area of expertise and being in any kind of relationship with him, whether it be friendship or just being flatmates, was sure to be taxing but he couldn't change, not for lack of trying.  And John had stuck around for and suffered through all of the sleepless nights, the demeaning, belittling comments, the endless talking, the violin at three in the morning that was no doubt heard through the thin walls and, on top of that, never gave any indication that he desired to leave.  Had John died, Sherlock would have been soon to follow though he was well aware that he would have deserved to live through whatever tumultuous emotions and numbing substances he found because it would have been entirely his fault.

 

"Years, Sherlock,  _years_ ," he began again, his voice steadily rising with each word and Sherlock braced himself for the screams.  "How the  _hell_  could you do something like that?  What kind of  _experiment_  is that?  Do you have any idea...."

 

He had begun to pace back and forth near the threshold of the flat, roughly pulling his hands through his hair.  Sherlock took a moment to be sure that his emotions were in check before he spoke so that his voice would come out calm instead of shaky.  "Moriarty, John, it was Moriarty.  I had to, he had to think that I was dead or--"

 

" _So you couldn't have just DISAPPEARED?_ "  John stopped abruptly and screamed at him, his face red and his eyes watering.  He paused, took a deep, rickety breath before continuing and a softer voice, his eyes closed.  "I had to--I watched you jump off a building, Sherlock.  I've seen people die, I've watched as my friends die but you can't imagine--it was something that we expected in Afghanistan, but here, I thought--" He broke off, pinching the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb.  "Here was safe and you were untouchable.  I had you so built up in my mind, the great, brilliant, untouchable  _Sherlock Holmes_  but you're made from the same stuff as the rest of us and I couldn't stop you from hitting the ground, I couldn't reach you in time."

 

"You weren't supposed to, John," he said, trying to sound as sorry and sympathetic as he felt.  Because he was sorry but he would have been even more sorry if John had been the one to die.

 

"And I was supposed to watch you die?" His eye's snapped up to glare at Sherlock but after a moment his glare faltered and soften and he looked at the ground again, continuing before Sherlock could even think of something to say.  "You were my  _friend_ , Sherlock, my  _best_ friend.  I used to have nightmares about the war, wake up shaking and I could never catch my breath, but these days I have nightmares about...that day.  It was cloudy.  The nights that I'm not...drunk enough I have to see you--I have to watch you falling.  I could hear you hit the pavement that day, you know; I was that far away and I could hear you--I knew that you had to be--would have been dead before I even made it to you.  And the blood...Oh God, Sherlock, it was...it was everywhere that I looked and it was _yours_.  Your eyes....A day hasn't gone by that I haven't had to see...I would have gladly drank bleach if it meant I wouldn't have to see....But I didn't--couldn't--because it was the last memory I had of you.  The last mystery of the great Sherlock Holmes that I could never solve.  I could never figure out why you did that.  I couldn't imagine anything that would force you to result to something so extreme...we could have figured something else out...I would have...."

 

"John--" Sherlock started but he cut him off with a glare and continued.

 

"As if it ended there.  You're everywhere in the bloody city Sherlock.  I can't walk a mile down the road without seeing something that reminds me of  _you_.  The cigarette smoke in the air, a dog barking, a damn chemistry text book in some kid's arms.  Do you have any idea what that's like? And this whole time...with all the drinking and drugs and  _you're fine_." He paused, taking another shaky breath.  "I don't understand  _why_."

 

His last words were so soft that Sherlock barely heard them.  "It was for you.  I couldn't let--"

 

But John interrupted him again, his voice closer to a yell now but it still quavered.  "No, Sherlock.  What you did...that could  _not_ have been for me.  In fact, that was the worst thing you could have done to me."

 

He scoffed, he knew it was inappropriate but he couldn't help himself.  "There are far worse things John."

 

"Not for me.  I was  _alone_ , Sherlock.  I was so alone and I was _done_.  I didn't have a gun because I anticipated shooting a cabbie with it.  But I met you and I had a friend and with all those cases there was finally  _something_  for me to think about, something to distract me.  And you left Sherlock.  You left me alone again....I would have gladly taken death over solitude.  I've tried a few times, but...."

 

Sherlock closed his eyes and wet his lips, trying to come up with something to say but, to his surprise, the words were already falling past his lips without consent.  "I didn't think it would matter so much.  I didn't think that you would miss...." He didn't realize that it was true, what he had said, until the words were already out there, suspended in the thick silence.  

 

John looked up at him, his eyes were flashing with anger or distrust anymore but Sherlock couldn't place the emotion.  It made the shadows under his soft eyes seem more prominent and it outlined the exhaustion in his features.  He opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to decide what to say or how to say it but finally settling on, "I need to go out."

 

He stood up, grabbed his coat off of the arm of the sofa, and Sherlock didn't dare try to stop him.

 

In the doorway, he paused and looked back, his stare was piercing and Sherlock nearly felt the need to flinch.  "Just promise me...one thing right now."

 

He nodded and John continued but his voice faltered at the end and, if Sherlock wasn't mistaken, his eyes were watering again.  "Be here when I get back."

 

"I promise."

 


End file.
